Indian Country

Indian Country

The FBI is responsible for the safety of the 566 federally recognized Indian tribes in the United States.

Audio Transcript

Mollie Halpern: The FBI is responsible for the safety of the 566 federally recognized Indian Tribes in the United States.

Kevin Killigrew: The FBI is a national resource—we’re here for everybody in the United States. We have an obligation to the tribal people, and we’re fulfilling it.

Halpern: I’m Mollie Halpern, and this is FBI, This Week. About 118 special agents from 21 of our field offices investigate the most serious of crimes on more than 200 Indian reservations. Crime rates on reservations tend to be higher than those of small towns. Supervisory Special Agent Kevin Killigrew says the Indian Country agents handle all homicides and sexual molestation cases of children under the age of 12.

Killigrew: Child molestation is a systemic problem; it seems to be pervasive throughout the reservations.

Halpern: The FBI partners with the Department of Interior’s Bureau of Indian Affairs and tribal police.

Killigrew: We have a lot more resources than a lot of these tribal departments do—we can bring in the Evidence Response Team, we can bring in the cyber experts…